OS X Lion Likely Out Next Week, New MacBook Airs to Follow?

If you’re one of a handful of lucky dev folks who got their hands on the OS X Lion upgrade early, nice job!

But for the general public, 9to5 Mac and Apple Insider have both gotten confirmation from several Apple retail employees that there’s an overnight scheduled on July 13th to freshen up their stores, likely indicating a July 14th release date. For Apple, overnights have traditionally occurred prior to big product releases.

Apple Insider also reports that a large part of the preparation involves upgrading the RAM on store computers by July 10th (at the latest) so that OS X Lion can run without hitches. Sources are also indicating that some customers will be able to receive the upgrade in-store so as to be walked through the new OS.

As we’ve reported previously, OS X Lion will be available for $29.99 and can be downloaded, though it’s a hefty 4 GB file. In terms of features, it will have the ability to run apps in full screen, multi-touch gestures for computers with trackpads, and automatic saving and versioning of documents so that you can close out of them without having to manually save.

Sources also indicate that a new MacBook Air refresh will be occurring soon after, possibly the following week. The update of the ultra-portable laptops was reportedly postponed in order to accommodate the launch of OS X Lion.